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Monthly Archives: November 2013

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I like to think that the first verse is about me. It really could be, if you listen to the lyrics. It explains my problem. This song is so beautiful, though, and right now, it seems to really sum up my feelings.

Forgive me, Jesus.

Tell me I’m not tainted. I do stupid things, I look for attention, I want to be flattered by men. I look to men for the love I can only find in You. Just now, I reminded myself just how skewed I am. I was just playing a word game on my phone, and my opponent told me I was pretty. He started flirting, and soon enough, the conversation became sexual on his end. I didn’t encourage it: I told him that I’m a chaste Catholic girl and that I’m not comfortable with talking about that. I didn’t stop him, though. I didn’t get offline or anything, I just kept messaging him and gently trying to prod the conversation elsewhere. It was uncomfortable and I knew I should stop talking to him, but then he started telling me how my chastity made me even more desirable, how that turned him on all the more, and somehow my insecure, love-deprived little heart took that as a compliment.

I’m pretty sure this guy was at least in his mid twenties. He works as a family and marriage therapist, he said, in clinical psychology. He’s a grown man. It got really bad, Lord. He started telling me that he was fantasizing about me, that he was touching himself while thinking about me. And why, why, why didn’t I tell him to stop? Why didn’t I get offline? Was I flattered, Lord? I feel disgusted with myself for the things I’m willing to do to feel “loved.” I just don’t know how I feel about myself because I can switch so quickly between self-love and self-loath. Jesus, I need You. I’m crying out for You, but I don’t know where You are. Lord, I’m lost right now. I just need to trust that You’re all I need.

VATICAN CITY — Today on the feast of All Saints, Pope Francis revealed the secrets to holiness, saying it’s not some rare “privilege for the few,” but an inheritance everyone receives at baptism.

“Saints aren’t superheroes nor were they born perfect. They are like us, each one of us,” just that when they experienced the life-changing encounter with God,” they never left his side, the pope said during today’s Angelus address.

Pope Francis essentially gave a road-map today for how to follow this path to holiness. The path “has a name and a face,” he said. “It’s the face of Jesus Christ. He teaches us to become saints.”

So You Want to Be a Saint — Secrets of Success:

Experience God’s love.

Follow God with your whole heart, without compromise, without hypocrisy.

Spend your life serving others.

Bear suffering and adversity without hating. “Saints never hated,” the pope said…